G'Day Chair by Brian Sayer and Christopher Connell, 1988

Designed by Brian Sayer and Christopher Connell under their studio G'Day Chair Co in Queen Street, Woollahra, and cast at Central Foundry in 1988, the G'Day Chair is one of the most distinctive pieces of Australian industrial design to emerge from the bicentennial year. Both designers were migrants to Australia, and the chair is their love letter to the slang and larrikin culture they made their own.

The chair is cast in aluminium reclaimed from recycled cans, including beer cans, which gives the piece both its lightness and its quiet cultural punchline. The form spells out the greeting itself: the back is built from the letters G and D set above an apostrophe and the letter A, while the single front leg is the Y. Read it from the side and the word G'Day appears in the silhouette.

Cast in three sections, the chair is structurally light and was originally designed to fold flat into a cardboard carton for shipping, an early nod to flat-pack thinking well before it became standard. The construction is honest and sculptural, with the raw character of the cast aluminium left on show.

This example was exhibited at the Powerhouse Museum in Sydney. The design has never been re-cast, and the edition is limited as indicated by the serial number stamped on the piece. A rare survivor of late-80s Australian design and a museum-grade conversation piece for a collector, gallery or studio.

Dimension: Height: 87 cm Width: 40cm Depth: 38cm

Designers: Brian Sayer and Christopher Connell (G'Day Chair Co)
Year: 1988
Origin: Woollahra, Sydney, Australia (Central Foundry, 1988)
Material: Cast aluminium (recycled cans, including beer cans)
Construction: Three-section cast, folds flat
Provenance: Exhibited at the Powerhouse Museum, Sydney
Edition: Limited, serial-numbered, never re-cast
Condition: Original, as photographed